Mar. 15, 2013

Written by

Free Press Staff Writer

MONTPELIER — The Senate has given preliminary approval to a bill that would lift the current blanket ban on public access to criminal investigative records and direct instead that the records are open with seven exceptions.

“The exemptions provided here are what is in the federal Freedom of Information Act,” Senate Judiciary Chairman Richard Sears, D-Bennington, explained, referring to the first six exceptions cited in the bill.

The six federally modeled exemptions say records could be withheld if their release could:

• Interfere with enforcement.

• Deprive someone of the right to a fair trial.

• Constitute unwarranted invasion of personal privacy.

• Disclose the identity of a confidential source.

• Disclose techniques and procedures for law-enforcement investigations or prosecutions.

• Endanger someone’s life.

Sears noted, “We provided a little extra protection.”

The seventh exception states: “A public entity shall not reveal information that could be used to facilitate the commission of a crime or the name of a private individual who is a witness to or victim of a crime, unless withholding the name or information would conceal government wrongdoing.”

The seventh exception has been the most contentious, Sears said. The League of Cities and Towns advocated two extra exemptions that the ACLU of Vermont opposed.

Friday, however, both organizations seemed to find the Judiciary Committee’s revised seventh exception to be acceptable.

“It does retain the essence of what we were interested in,” the league’s Karen Horn said.

“We think all this language is unnecessary,” Allen Gilbert, executive director of the ACLU of Vermont, said of the seventh exception.

“Compared with what is in place now, this bill is a vast improvement, such a vast improvement that it deserves support,” Gilbert said. “We are heartened it got unanimous support on second reading.”